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| Chapter XII.—Of the difference between life and death; of the breath of life and the vivifying Spirit: also how it is that the substance of flesh revives which once was dead.
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Chapter XII.—Of the difference
between life and death; of the breath of life and the vivifying Spirit: also
how it is that the substance of flesh revives which once was dead.
1. For as the flesh is capable of corruption, so
is it also of incorruption; and as it is of death, so is it also of life.
These two do mutually give way to each other; and both cannot remain in
the same place, but one is driven out by the other, and the presence of
the one destroys that of the other. If, then, when death takes possession
of a man, it drives life away from him, and proves him to be dead, much
more does life, when it has obtained power over the man, drive out death,
and restore him as living unto God. For if death brings mortality, why
should not life, when it comes, vivify man? Just as Esaias the prophet
says, “Death devoured when it had prevailed.”4531
And again, “God has wiped away every
tear from every face.” Thus that former life is expelled, because
it was not given by the Spirit, but by the breath.
2. For the
breath of life, which also rendered man an animated being, is one thing,
and the vivifying Spirit another, which also caused him to become
spiritual. And for this reason Isaiah said, “Thus saith the Lord, who made heaven and
established it, who founded the earth and the things therein, and gave
breath to the people
upon it, and Spirit to those walking
upon it;”4532
thus telling us that
breath is indeed given in common to all people upon earth, but that the
Spirit is theirs alone who tread down earthly desires. And therefore
Isaiah himself, distinguishing the things already mentioned, again
exclaims, “For the Spirit shall go forth from Me, and I have made
every breath.”4533
Thus does he attribute
the Spirit as peculiar to God which in the last times He pours forth upon
the human race by the adoption of sons; but [he shows] that breath was
common throughout the creation, and points it out as something created.
Now what has been made is a different thing from him who makes it. The
breath, then, is temporal, but the Spirit eternal. The breath, too,
increases [in strength] for a short period, and continues for a certain
time; after that it takes its departure, leaving its former abode
destitute of breath. But when the Spirit pervades the man within and
without, inasmuch as it continues there, it never leaves him. “But
that is not first which is spiritual,” says the apostle, speaking
this as if with reference to us human beings; “but that is first
which is animal, afterwards that which is spiritual,”4534
in accordance with reason. For there had been
a necessity that, in the first place, a human being should be fashioned,
and that what was fashioned should receive the soul; afterwards that it
should thus receive the communion of the Spirit. Wherefore also
“the first Adam was made” by the Lord “a living soul,
the second Adam a quickening spirit.”4535
As, then, he who was made a living soul forfeited life when he
turned aside to what was evil, so, on the other hand, the same
individual, when he reverts to what is good, and receives the quickening
Spirit, shall find life.
3. For it is not one thing which dies and another
which is quickened, as neither is it one thing which is lost and another
which is found, but the Lord came seeking for that same sheep which had
been lost. What was it, then, which was dead? Undoubtedly it was the
substance of the flesh; the same, too, which had lost the breath of life,
and had become breathless and dead. This same, therefore, was what the
Lord came to quicken, that as in Adam we do all die, as being of an
animal nature, in Christ we may all live, as being spiritual, not laying
aside God’s handiwork, but the lusts of the flesh, and receiving
the Holy Spirit; as the apostle says in the Epistle to the Colossians:
“Mortify, therefore, your members which are upon the earth.”
And what these are he himself explains: “Fornication, uncleanness,
inordinate affection, evil concupiscence; and covetousness, which is
idolatry.”4536
The laying aside of these
is what the apostle preaches; and he declares that those who do such
things, as being merely flesh and blood, cannot inherit the kingdom of
heaven. For their soul, tending towards what is worse, and descending to
earthly lusts, has become a partaker in the same designation which
belongs to these [lusts, viz., “earthly”], which, when the
apostle commands us to lay aside, he says in the same Epistle,
“Cast ye off the old man with his deeds.”4537
But when he said this, he does not remove away the ancient
formation [of man]; for in that case it would be incumbent on us to rid
ourselves of its company by committing suicide.
4. But the apostle himself also, being one who had been
formed in a womb, and had issued thence, wrote to us, and confessed in
his Epistle to the Philippians that “to live in the flesh was the
fruit of [his] work;”4538
thus
expressing himself. Now the final result of the work of the Spirit is the
salvation of the flesh.4539
| 4539
Following Harvey’s explanation of a somewhat obscure passage.
| For what other visible fruit is there of the invisible Spirit,
than the rendering of the flesh mature and capable of incorruption? If
then [he says], “To live in the flesh, this is the result of labour
to me,” he did not surely contemn the substance of flesh in that
passage where he said, “Put ye off the old man with his
works;”4540
but he points out that we
should lay aside our former conversation, that which waxes old and
becomes corrupt; and for this reason he goes on to say, “And put ye
on the new man, that which is renewed in knowledge, after the image of
Him who created him.” In this, therefore, that he says,
“which is renewed in knowledge,” he demonstrates that he, the
selfsame man who was in ignorance in times past, that is, in ignorance of
God, is renewed by that knowledge which has respect to Him. For the
knowledge of God renews man. And when he says, “after the image of
the Creator,” he sets forth the recapitulation of the same man, who
was at the beginning made after the likeness of God.
5. And that he, the apostle, was the very same person
who had been born from the womb, that is, of the ancient substance of
flesh, he does himself declare in the Epistle to the Galatians:
“But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother’s
womb, and called me by His grace, to reveal His Son in me, that I might
preach Him among the Gentiles,”4541
it was
not, as I have already observed, one person who had
been
born from the womb, and another who preached the Gospel of the Son of
God; but that same individual who formerly was ignorant, and used to
persecute the Church, when the revelation was made to him from heaven,
and the Lord conferred with him, as I have pointed out in the third
book,4542
| 4542 Vol. i. pp. 306,
321. | preached the Gospel of Jesus Christ the Son of God, who
was crucified under Pontius Pilate, his former ignorance being driven out
by his subsequent knowledge: just as the blind men whom the Lord healed
did certainly lose their blindness, but received the substance of their
eyes perfect, and obtained the power of vision in the very same eyes with
which they formerly did not see; the darkness being merely driven away by
the power of vision, while the substance of the eyes was retained, in
order that, by means of those eyes through which they had not seen,
exercising again the visual power, they might give thanks to Him who had
restored them again to sight. And thus, also, he whose withered hand was
healed, and all who were healed generally, did not change those parts of
their bodies which had at their birth come forth from the womb, but
simply obtained these anew in a healthy condition.
6. For the Maker of all things, the Word of God, who
did also from the beginning form man, when He found His handiwork
impaired by wickedness, performed upon it all kinds of healing. At one
time [He did so], as regards each separate member, as it is found in His
own handiwork; and at another time He did once for all restore man sound
and whole in all points, preparing him perfect for Himself unto the
resurrection. For what was His object in healing [different] portions of
the flesh, and restoring them to their original condition, if those parts
which had been healed by Him were not in a position to obtain salvation?
For if it was [merely] a temporary benefit which He conferred, He granted
nothing of importance to those who were the subjects of His healing. Or
how can they maintain that the flesh is incapable of receiving the life
which flows from Him, when it received healing from Him? For life is
brought about through healing, and incorruption through life. He,
therefore, who confers healing, the same does also confer life; and He
[who gives] life, also surrounds His own handiwork with incorruption. E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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